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Damian Gauss
Damian Jordan Gauss (b. March 18, 1992) is a Georgeland politician and former professional footballer. He is the founder and Chairman of the People's Party of Long Island and a significant figure in the Long Island government, although he does not hold any ministerial office. Gauss is the son of Janet Gauss , who is the leader of Vox, of which the People's Party is a major component. Gauss' professional football career began at 16, but ended prematurely through a serious spinal injury after a car accident in 2015, which left him a paraplegic. He became a disability rights advocate and a political activist, and entered politics in 2017, aged only 25, when he was elected as an independent to the Legislature of Long Island. In 2019, Gauss founded the People's Party, which won 20% of the vote and nine seats in the snap election held that year. Gauss is a prominent powerbroker in Long Island politics, and one of the main leaders of the Vox movement, but he holds no office other than his seat in Long Island. Early life and education Gauss was born in 1992 in Dannyburg, the son of Morgan and Janet Gauss. He is the second of three children; his elder brother Toby Gauss was elected to the Long Island state legislature in 2019. His sister, Melissa Gauss, is a marketing and communications manager. At the time of his birth, his mother was a civil servant and his father a solicitor. Gauss was raised in Dannyburg and attended Auburn High School. At school, he excelled in physical education and sport, earning the school's championship in both football (soccer) and cricket in 2007. Football career Gauss was scouted by Dannyburg FC in 2007 and made his debut for the club's youth team in 2008. A talented striker, Gauss also excelled in midfield positions. As a left-footed player, he was recruited for several different team configurations, but was most commonly played as a Centre Midfield or Centre Forward. In 2010, aged eighteen, Gauss was first selected for the main Dannyburg FC squad, playing as a reserve forward in three matches. His first actual game on the pitch was against Santa Christina United on 17 February 2011, when he replaced the injured Peter Cooper. He was selected for the first squad, again replacing Cooper, for the team's next match, against Lylecity FC a week later. For the 2011-12 and 2012-13 seasons, Gauss was repeatedly rostered onto the first team. He became the primary striker and centre forward for the team beginning in March 2013. His new contract made him the youngest player in the league on a six-figure salary, and with a new contract from October, signed to prevent a potential transfer to Lylecity, Gauss was the highest-paid player under 25 in the entire league. With an incredibly quick turn-of-speed and pinpoint-accuracy with shots, Gauss very rapidly became one of the most prominent and popular players not only for Dannyburg but in the league. He scored 23 goals for Dannyburg in the 2012-13 season, eight on penalties, and beat his own record in 2014, scoring 32 goals, which was two-thirds of the team's entire total that season. Described by football commentator Barry Goodfellow as "an unstoppable machine", Gauss was given a lucrative sponsorship deal by Nike in 2014, and was a spokesman and brand ambassador for Pepsi Max during the same period. This brought his annual earning well over three million dollars. International caps Gauss was first selected for the national side for an international friendly against France in 2013, as a reserve. In May of that year he was chosen as a centre forward for a World Cup qualifier against Australia, and scored two goals (Georgeland was defeated 3-2), and from that point remained a more-or-less permanent member of the national squad, while continuing his club career. He scored his first international hat trick in another qualifying match against Japan in June 2013, but was sent off in the 64th minute of his next match, against North Korea, in July. Suffering from a three-match ban, Gauss was not part of the squad for Georgeland's qualifier against Bahrain, at which the side was defeated 1-0. From 2013 to his retirement in 2015, Gauss scored 15 goals for the national side, a record for a two-year appearance with the team. Injury and retirement At 7:15 pm April 29, 2015, Gauss was severely injured in a motor vehicle accident. He and a friend, Tony Patrick, were travelling along the R7 highway from Doubledance to Huzzah, where they were due to attend a social event the following night. Gauss' 2013 Aston Martin V12 Vantage collided with a bollard along the centre of the four-lane road. Gauss, who was at the wheel, reported later that he had no memory of the accident. Patrick, in the passenger seat, reported Gauss lost control of the vehicle in wet conditions, having swerved to avoid another driver who was erratic. The vehicle hit the bollard at approximately 96kp/h and overturned on impact, landing on its roof in the oncoming lane. Patrick suffered significant injuries including a fractured skull and two broken legs, but was able to exit the vehicle and call emergency services. When paramedics arrived they found Gauss unconcious and unresponsive. He was taken to Columbine Hospital in Warwick where he was discovered to have fractured several vertebrae and his spinal cord. Gauss was in a medically-induced coma for a week before being revived. In critical condition for the next two months, he underwent physical therapy and multiple surgeries to attempt to repair the damage to his spinal cord. On July 6, he was told by doctors that it was very likely his spinal cord injury would result in paraplegia. According to Gauss, had the injury been in a slightly lower place on his spinal cord, he would probably have been rendered quadraplegic. As it was, he retained upper-body mobility, but still has difficulty moving his left arm, and cannot move his head to the same extent as an able-bodied person. While he had been on medical leave since the accident, the injuries he sustained were clearly too severe for Gauss to continue his football career. He was officially retired on January 5, 2016, despite not having played since the previous April. He was only 23 years old when retired and remains the youngest person to have retired from Primary Division football; however, his retirement was forced due to injury rather than voluntary. Gauss left hospital on September 1, 2015 after five months. Activism Unable to continue to play primary division football, Gauss initially took a position as a journalist and commentator on the game with the Dannyburg Tribune, but left after only six weeks. Later, Gauss said he found the work uninteresting, and that not being able to play football, his great passion, left him in a depressed mental state. He said in an interview that he spent several weeks at a time playing video games (including FIFA 16) and watching Netflix . Gauss told interviewers later that the "light bulb moment" for him was a documentary on US President Franklin Roosevelt. Gauss said that he had never learned about Roosevelt and did not know that the American leader during World War II had been paraplegic, having been partly paralysed by an illness in 1921 (believed at the time to have been polio , but more likely to have been Guillain-Barré syndrome). Gauss said he had never before realised that someone could become President of the United States in a wheelchair, and that he felt inspired by the story to become active in politics and in the community. Gauss had never been particularly interested in politics before, but said the Roosevelt story was like "being hit with a bolt from the gods." Gauss became an advocate for disability sufferers, a popular motivational speaker, and a spokesperson for the National Disability Rights Association (NDRA). In Dannyburg he began mentoring young children with disabilities, and in October 2016 founded the Damian Gauss Scholarship, a program encouraging and sponsoring athletes with disabilities to enter both public and private schools and universities. At the same time, Gauss began studying for a Bachelors Degree in Communications at the University of Long Island. In December 2016, Gauss was named as Georgeland's Ambassador-at-large for Disability Rights, a position created for him by the federal government. He was also appointed to the National Disabilities Council. A poll in January 2017 said Gauss was the most admired person in Georgeland. Political career In 2016 Gauss was approached by both the Liberal Democrats and the Green Party to run for the House of Commons, but he declined both offers. The following year he announced his candidacy for the Long Island legislature seat of Hyslop, in the Dannyburg suburbs. Running as an independent candidate, Gauss polled second behind the Liberal Democrat incumbent, Mark Boone, but was elected on Green Party preferences. As a member of the legislature, Gauss introduced the Disability Access Act of 2017, which mandated every public agency and private business with government grants have a disability access plan, with reportable performance markers, and financial penalties for non-compliance. He also co-sponsored legislation making physical education mandatory in schools for children with disabilities, which was matched with a series of state grants to enable training in disability education and physical needs among Long Island teachers. People's Party founder In October 2018, Gauss announced the formation of the People's Party of Long Island. The party was a community-focused, broadly populist movement led by Gauss which advocated for greater autonomy for individual communities, investment in regional infrastructure, strong action on climate change and electoral and political reforms. Gauss said the party would contest multiple state and federal seats. Gauss subsequently announced a 'partnership' between the PPLI and Ita, led by his friend Ross Golding. This partnernship became the basis of the Vox alliance, which in 2019 won the second-most seats in the House of Commons and became the official opposition. State election At the 2019 state election, held due to the loss of confidence in the Conservative government, the People's Party won nine seats, the second-most (behind the Tories) and no party won a majority. Gauss said that he would consider a coalition with other parties, but the Conservatives ruled out any such arrangement. On 14 April, the Green Party and Liberal Democrats agreed to back the People's Party in a minority government. Despite the Conservatives having the most seats, the Acting Governor, Michelle Seles, invited Gauss to form a government. In a press conference, Gauss said he was not prepared to be Chief Minister and suggested Joe Cornwall, another successful People's Party candidate and former business executive, for the position. The Green Party then declared they would not support Cornwall due to his rejection of a carbon pricing mechanism, and instead nominated their own leader, Joe Llewellyn. The People's Party rejected Llewellyn but offered Ian Barwell, former head of the Association of Primary Producers (APP) and a longtime regional advocate, as Chief Minister. With Barwell acceptable to all parties in the coalition, he was commissioned as Chief Minister. Gauss remained as Chairman of the People's Party and a significant government figure, but he did not accept any ministerial office. Personal life Gauss began dating Rebecca Wickham in 2016. The couple live in Dannyburg.